Franklin Archibald Dick (May 2, 1823 – February 18, 1885) was an American lawyer, politician and military officer during the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states ...

. He served as a Republican member of the Missouri state legislature and worked with Francis P. Blair Jr. to oppose slavery in Missouri. He served as volunteer assistant

adjutant general An adjutant general is a military chief administrative officer. France In Revolutionary France, the was a senior staff officer, effectively an assistant to a general officer. It was a special position for lieutenant-colonels and colonels in staf ...

to Brigadier General

Nathaniel Lyon Nathaniel Lyon (July 14, 1818 – August 10, 1861) was the first Union general to be killed in the American Civil War. He is noted for his actions in Missouri in 1861, at the beginning of the conflict, to forestall secret secessionist plans of th ...

in the struggle to prevent

Missouri secession During the American Civil War, the secession of Missouri from the Union was controversial because of the state's disputed status. Missouri was claimed by both the Union and the Confederacy, had two rival state governments, and sent representativ ...

to the Confederacy that resulted in the Camp Jackson Affair. He also served as Missouri

provost marshal general The provost marshal general (pronounced "provo") is a United States Army staff position that handles investigations of U.S. Army personnel. It is the highest-ranking provost marshal position in the U.S. Army, reporting to the Chief of Staff of ...

and lieutenant colonel under Major General

Samuel Curtis Samuel Curtis (born in Walworth, Surrey on 29 August 1779-died at La Chaire, Rozel Bay, Jersey, on 6 January 1860

. After the war, he worked as a law partner with

Montgomery Blair Montgomery Blair (May 10, 1813 – July 27, 1883) was an American politician and lawyer from Maryland. He served in the Lincoln administration cabinet as Postmaster-General from 1861 to 1864, during the Civil War. He was the son of Francis Pres ...

at the

Blair House Blair House, also known as The President's Guest House, is an official residence in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. The President's Guest House has been called "the world's most exclusive hotel" because it is primarily used ...

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

Early life and education

Dick was born in

Chester, Pennsylvania Chester is a city in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, United States. Located within the Philadelphia Metropolitan Area, it is the only city in Delaware County and had a population of 32,605 as of the 2020 census. Incorporated in 1682, Chester i ...

on May 2, 1823, the only son of Archibald Thomas Dick and Hannah Rogers. He entered the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

at the age of sixteen in 1839 as a law student. He graduated in 1842 and moved to the then frontier town of

St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...

, where he practiced law from 1844 to 1861. He worked as an assistant editor at the St. Louis Democrat newspaper. He was an active supporter of the movement to abolish slavery and joined the

Free Soil Party The Free Soil Party was a short-lived coalition political party in the United States active from 1848 to 1854, when it merged into the Republican Party. The party was largely focused on the single issue of opposing the expansion of slavery int ...

in 1849. He became a member of the Republican Party upon its founding in 1854. In 1857, he was elected to the Missouri legislature and voted for the end of slavery in Missouri. He married Myra Madison Alexander on November 25, 1851. Myra's sister, Apolline, was married to Francis Preston Blair Jr., a Missouri congressman and a leader of the

Unconditional Union Party The Unconditional Union Party was a loosely organized political entity during the American Civil War and the early days of Reconstruction. First established in 1861 in Missouri, where secession talk was strong, the party fully supported the pre ...

. Dick helped organize the business affairs of Blair when he fell into debt after the 1857 depression.

American Civil War

Camp Jackson affair

After the election of President Lincoln, the pro-secessionist governor of Missouri, Clairborne F. Jackson was expected to lead Missouri to secede from the Union. Dick, Blair and other pro Union advocates in the city of St. Louis were concerned that Jackson would take possession of the St. Louis Arsenal and use the large stock of arms kept there to support Confederate leaning militias. Blair and Captain (later brigadier general)

transferred the arms from the St. Louis Arsenal to

Alton, Illinois Alton ( ) is a city on the Mississippi River in Madison County, Illinois, Madison County, Illinois, United States, about north of St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri. The population was 25,676 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. It is a p ...

to prevent their capture and usage by pro-confederacy militias. In mid-April 1861, Jackson wrote to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, asking for heavy artillery to breach the walls of the arsenal. Around May 1, Jackson called up part of the Missouri Volunteer Militia (MVM) for "maneuvers" near St. Louis, under the command of Brigadier General Daniel M. Frost. The MVM set up Camp Jackson, about northwest of the arsenal. Davis agreed to Jackson's request and delivered two 12-pound howitzers, two 32-pound siege guns, 500 muskets, and ammunition. MVM officers met the shipment at the St. Louis riverfront, and transported them to Camp Jackson. Lyon wanted to scout Camp Jackson for himself. Dick borrowed a dress, shawl and bonnet from his mother in law in order to disguise the general. Dick provided the carriage and Lyon was able to observe the camp from inside the carriage disguised as Dick's mother in law and reported back that secessionist flags were flown within the camp and Confederate guns were located at the camp. On May 10, 1861, Lyon, Blair, and other Unionists met in Dick's law office and decided to capture Camp Jackson. At Lyon's urging, Dick served as his volunteer assistant adjutant general during the Camp Jackson affair. Lyon, with the Home Guards and a U.S. regular Army company, captured several hundred secessionist state militia which had been positioned to seize the Arsenal. The Camp Jackson Affair gave the Federal cause a decisive initial advantage in Missouri but also inflamed secessionist sentiments in the state. Dick was sent by Blair to Washington to convey concerns to President Lincoln about General William S. Harney's leniency in dealing with secessionists. Montgomery Blair took Dick to meet with President Lincoln and Secretary of War

Simon Cameron Simon Cameron (March 8, 1799June 26, 1889) was an American businessman and politician who represented Pennsylvania in the United States Senate and served as United States Secretary of War under President Abraham Lincoln at the start of the Americ ...

. Dick had been directed to lobby for Nathaniel Lyon's ideas for the protection of St. Louis, ask for Lyon's confirmation as brigadier general, and request Harney's removal. Dick returned to St. Louis with Lincoln's promotion for Lyon effective May 17, and an order for Blair to remove Harney at his discretion. When Harney met with the former governor and head of the

Missouri State Guard The Missouri State Guard (MSG) was a military force established by the Missouri General Assembly on May 11, 1861. While not a formation of the Confederate States Army, the Missouri State Guard fought alongside Confederate troops and, at variou ...

Sterling Price Major-General Sterling "Old Pap" Price (September 14, 1809 – September 29, 1867) was a senior officer of the Confederate States Army who commanded infantry in the Western and Trans-Mississippi theaters of the American Civil War. Prior to ...

, the Union supporters led by Blair delivered the orders on May 30, 1862, which opened the way for Lyon to take control of troops in Missouri. Dick continued to write letters to Lincoln with updates on the state of affairs in Missouri.

Provost marshal general

After Camp Jackson was disbanded, Missouri was under

martial law Martial law is the imposition of direct military control of normal civil functions or suspension of civil law by a government, especially in response to an emergency where civil forces are overwhelmed, or in an occupied territory. Use Marti ...

, and remained so for the entire Civil War. Dick served on the Board of Assessments which identified and fined Southern sympathizers. Through his participation in the seizure of goods and banishment of Rebels and their families, he earned the hatred of many old St. Louisans, Conditional Unionists, and Rebels. On November 5, 1862, Dick was commissioned by Governor

Hamilton Rowan Gamble Hamilton Rowan Gamble (November 29, 1798 – January 31, 1864) was an American jurist and politician who served as the Chief Justice of the Missouri Supreme Court at the time of the Dred Scott case in 1852. Although his colleagues voted to over ...

as aide-de-camp to Major General Samuel Curtis with the rank of lieutenant colonel. General Curtis assigned Dick as provost marshal general for the Department of Missouri which included the states of Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas and sections of Illinois and Tennessee. In this position, Dick was responsible to keep order in the state and oversee the local provost marshals, enforce Curtis's orders for the Confiscation Act of 1862, banish and assess disloyal persons, and supervise prisons and prisoners. Dick moved his family back and forth from St. Louis to Philadelphia for safety during the war, though he had to return to his law practice in St. Louis to earn a living. He was superseded as provost marshal general by James Brodhead.

After the war

Franklin Archibald Dick gravestone in Laurel Hill Cemetery

After the Civil War ended, at the urging of Francis P. Blair Sr., Dick practiced law with

, working out of offices in the Blair House on Pennsylvania Avenue across from the

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in ...

. The Blair House is now the official guest house for the White House. Dick purchased a summer home he named "Hillside" near West Chester, Pennsylvania. Dick died on February 18, 1885, and was interred in

Laurel Hill Cemetery Laurel Hill Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery in the East Falls neighborhood of Philadelphia. Founded in 1836, it was the second major rural cemetery in the United States after Mount Auburn Cemetery in Boston, Massachusetts. The cemetery is ...

in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Citations

Sources

* * * Gerteis, Louis
Civil War St. Louis
Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2001 * Laas, Virginia Jeans. Wartime Washington: The Civil War Letters of Elizabeth Blair Lee. Urbana:University of Illinois Press, 1999 * * * Winter, William C. The Civil War in St. Louis: A Guided Tour. St. Louis: Missouri Historical Society Press, 1994

External links

Library of Congress - Abraham Lincoln papers: Series 2. General Correspondence. 1858-1864: Franklin A. Dick to Montgomery Blair, Monday, January 26, 1863 (Affairs in Missouri; endorsed by Francis P. Blair, Sr.)Missouri Historical Society - Letter signed F.A. Dick, Head Quarters, Department of the Missouri, Office of the Provost Marshal General, St. Louis, MO., to Colonel Wm. T. Mason (William T. Mason), January 19, 1863Missouri State Archives - Letter, from Franklin A. Dick, Washington D.C. to Benjamin Gratz Brown, January 23, 1872The State Historical Society of Missouri - Missouri, Monroe County. Provost Marshal's Papers, 1862-1865
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dick, Franklin Archibald 1823 births 1885 deaths 19th-century American lawyers 19th-century American newspaper editors Adjutants general of the United States Army Burials at Laurel Hill Cemetery (Philadelphia) Lawyers from Philadelphia Republican Party members of the Missouri House of Representatives Missouri Free Soilers People from Chester, Pennsylvania People of Missouri in the American Civil War Dick, Franklin Archibald University of Pennsylvania alumni